The Best Graphics Cards of 2013

Posted by Andreas Christodoulou

Description :

What's the golden rule of building a gaming rig? You don't skimp on the GPU. Processors, RAM, hard drives and accessories can all be sacrificed without sabotaging the experience, but the graphics card is the heart of any gaming PC. 

It doesn't matter if it's a $500 budget machine or a $3,000 powerhouse.

Finding a balance between quality and price is tough. AMD and Nvidia are the two big manufacturers regarding chipsets (Radeon and GeForce), but several third-party companies assemble the actual video cards and add the memory.

Gigabyte GV-N670OC-2GD

Chipset: GeForce GTX 670

Memory: 2GB

Price: $285 on Newegg

This is the perfect card for the budget builder. The 670 is a middle-road chip from Nvidia capable of handling high settings from fan favorites like Skyrim and some GTA IV resolution mods. It's new anti-aliasing mode helps eliminate most of the jagged edges during gameplay without sacrificing frame rate, and you can game on three monitors from a single card (4-way SLI is optional if you want to go crazy).

On top of that, Gigabyte houses 2GB of video RAM on the card, which is standard, and keeps it all cool with three massive fans — all for less than $300.

EVGA 03G-P4-2784-KR

Chipset: GeForce GTX 780

Memory: 3GB

Price: $520 on Amazon

So the GTX 670 doesn't quite wet your whistle. We get it. You want to run that new Battlefield 4 download on ultra-high settings while gaming on several monitors. But at the same time, you're not made of money. The 780 is one of Nvidia's top chipsets and, while the price seems high at $520, it's actually modest in comparison to others (don't worry, we'll get to those).

The extra gigabyte of memory makes a difference too, as games like BF4 list 3GB as the recommended dosage for video memory. Any gaming PC equipped with an i7 and 16GB of RAM should have a card like this.

Sapphire Vapor-X

Chipset: Radeon HD 7970

Memory: 3GB

Price: $385 on Newegg

Nvidia and AMD are a bit like Ford and Chevrolet. Each have loyalists who swear by the product's superiority, but in the end it's really two versions of the same beast. The Radeon HD 7970 is the chipset from AMD that's comparable to a GTX 770 from Nvidia. Both chips can manage high to ultra-high settings on modern games and handle all the shadowing, smoothing and anti-aliasing a game can challenge.

The 3GB of memory is on par with any mid- to high-end card, and the Radeon is capable of 4K resolution if you can actually afford one of the displays.

EVGA 06-P4-2791-KR

Chipset: GeForce GTX Titan

Memory: 6GB

Price: $1,010 on SuperBiiz

Alright, no more child's play. You want the biggest, baddest video card on the market and you don't care what it costs. Nvidia has you covered. The GTX Titan is, by leaps and bounds, the sexiest chipset in gaming graphics. It packs every feature under the sun and is backed with 6GB of memory that could likely handle two games at once. This card doesn't run ultra-high settings on just today's games, but will run top-notch without skipping a frame for any 2014 game as well. It's a clean grand to buy, but this card is a Ferrari among Mustangs.

SEE ALSO: Game-Changing Reasons Why Parents Can Say Yes to Video Games

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*by andreascy*

Samsung All-in-one PC SERIES 9 hands on video

Posted by Andreas Christodoulou

Description :

The new Samsung All-in-one PC SERIES 9 offers a brilliant entertainment experience with immersive 3D technology, an ultra-clear yet super-thin 27" full HD display, and high quality sound optimized by JBL. 

In addition, the blistering power of the 2nd generation Intel Core i7 processor and on-board AMD Radeon graphics ensure you have all the processing and video power you'll need. 

*by andreascy*

AMD's Radeon HD 7970 super GPU is here

Posted by Andreas Christodoulou

Description :

We've talked on an older post about AMD's Radeon HD 6950 & 6970 high end Video cards. Today we' ll talk about Radeon HD 7970, AMD's first high end card release in their 7000 series, which is built on the latest 28nm manufacturing process. The Radeon HD 7970 represents the fastest single - GPU video card from AMD with a new core design and architecture.

AMD’s HD6970 was a huge success for the company, so the replacement card is certainly going to get a lot of media attention over the coming weeks. AMD claim it has ‘significantly more compute power than the HD6970′ with a brand new revolutionary architecture. With new technologies such as ‘ZeroCore’ power saving, is this the discrete solution to start 2012 with a bang?

The high end graphics sector has certainly no shortage of lightning quick, expensive products. Dual GPU discrete solutions such as the HD6990 and GTX590 have been leading the performance charts since they were released. In the single GPU sector it would be fair to say that AMD have not been able to oust Nvidia’s GTX580 from the top slot, instead targeting the HD6970 at a lower price point. I have had a soft spot for the GTX580 now for a long time, it is one of my favourite video cards of all time.

AMD’s HD7970 has been designed from the ground up redress the imbalance and to ensure that AMD remain competitive when Nvidia release their GTX580 replacement, shortly. The HD7970 has 2,047 stream processors and 3GB of GDDR5 memory connected via a 384 bit memory interface, so it certainly doesn’t seem to be cutting any performance corners, but is it enough to claim the performance throne as we head into 2012?

Specifications :

MANUFACTURER : AMD

SPECS STATUS : Official

SERIES : Radeon HD 7000

GPU MODEL : Tahiti XT

RELEASE DATE : Q4 2011

INTERFACE : PCI-E 3.0 x16

CORE CLOCK : 925 MHz

MEMORY CLOCK : 1375 MHz (5.5GHz)

MEMORY BANDWIDTH : 264 GB/sec

MAX POWER DRAW : 250 W

MEMORY SIZE : 3072 MB

MEMORY TYPE : GDDR5

MEMORY BUS TYPE : 384 bit

DIRECTX : 11.1

OPENGL : 4.0

PROCESS : 28 nm

FRAGMENT PIPELINES : 2048

TEXTURE UNITS : 128

RASTER : 32

The 7970's numbers are heavy as hell on paper : 3 GB of RAM, up to 32 internal computing units, the first use of PCI - E Gen 3, Direct X 11.1 support, and a fat, CPU-style L2 cache. That adds up to a potential six monitors gaming at once. And that's just with one—you can sling together up to four of these things at once. AMD is promising enormous gains over Nvidia's top cards - billing it as the world's fastest - but we'll hold off on judgment until we have something firmer than internal, synthetic benchmarks. Still, there's no reason to think this thing will be anything less than incredibly powerful, with both games (of course) and the bevy of desktop software it's capable of accelerating.

But it's not all about power! The 7970 is power with responsibility, or something. It's capable of ramping up its power consumption when needed - and scaling it down to practically zero when your desktop has been idling for a while. And it'll be quiet, unlike many GPU powerhouses - no leaf blower, if AMD is to be believed. They claim a new fan design and smarter ventilation angles will mean softer cooling. With all that horsepower, we hope so!

Again, we'll have to wait until the 7970 drops on January 9th (for $550) to see how the card stacks up IRL. If you want to punch Battlefield 3 down into submission, be excited. [AMD]

Enjoy the video :

Reference info on :

http://www.amd.com/us/products/desktop/graphics/7000/7970/Pages/radeon-7970.aspx

*by andreascy*

SuperTalent : AMD Interlagos Quad-Channel DDR3 RDIMM Memory

Posted by Andreas Christodoulou

Description :

Super Talent Technology, a leading manufacturer of Flash storage solutions and DRAM memory modules, recently announced a new line of high speed, quad-channel Registered DDR3 RDIMM modules for servers running at 1600MHz.

Super Talent is committed to bring the very the latest in technology. Today's new motherboards that support the new 16 core processors, now require a new type of RDIMMs, quad-channel DDR3. Super Talent is pleased to announce that theses new modules have passed extensive qualification testing and can support full speed at full loading.

Those familiar with server technology may know there is often problem when running fully loaded (all memory slots populated on a motherboard). The memory has to throttle its performance to compensate for the limitations of the CPU. For instance, memory rated for 1333MHz speeds would have to run at a lower to 1066MHz when the memory channel is filled. This prevents customers from fully populating the number of memory sticks in a triple channel system and thus reduces the amount of available memory. Not so with these new Super Talent modules. These new modules run fully loaded; that's 16 slots of memory running at 1600MHz.

Available in 2GB and 4GB capacities, your quad channel servers can now support capacities of up to 64GB @ 1600MHz.

Part Numbers :

W16RA2G8M (2GB)

W16RB4G8M (4GB)

About Super Talent Technology :

Super Talent Technology Corporation based in San Jose, California, designs and manufactures a full range of DDR, DDR2, and DDR3 memory modules and Flash based storage devices for computers and consumer electronics. An ISO 9001 certified company, Super Talent utilizes its state-of-the-art factories and leading-edge components to produce award winning products with outstanding reliability. Super Talent is an active member of the JEDEC and ONFI standards bodies.With over 250 patents, the company was ranked 38th in the 2009 Wall Street Journal's Patent ScorecardTM for the IT industry.

*by andreascy*

AMD Radeon HD 6950 & 6970 latest high-end Video Card series

Posted by Andreas Christodoulou

Description :

With the "Cayman" GPU architecture from AMD came two very good video card models : the Radeon HD 6950 and the 6970. These have both been excellent sellers for AMD and product partners. 

ASUS Radeon HD 6950 DirectCU II Overclocked :

It seems that every time we turn around there a new PC component that is new to the market that we must have. Just recently we see that AMD just received a new processor featuring quad-cores, Intel is right around the corner (we hope) with their new offering and before we can blank we will probably be seeing new Radeon 7xxx series graphic cards as well as Nvidia 7xx family models.

Don’t get me wrong I am a big fan of upgrading to the newest and faster product, will when I can afford them. But before we see these new GPUs, the current units are doing an awfully good job of performing and blasting through today’s video cards as well as other highly graphic utilized applications.

One of these graphic cards would be the Radeon HD 6950 from AMD. This particular GPU is considered by many to be the best band-for-the-buck cards out there. We won’t agree or disagree until we get a chance to put it on the bench.

The Radeon HD 6950 is from the Cayman Pro family that boasts an 800MHz core clock as well as 1250MHz GDDR5 memory clock. This along for many maybe enough to consider the card a worthy purchase but the 1408 shader processors and 2GB of memory definitely does help a lot.

Our sample we are testing today is from ASUS and you know they are not ones to leave reference numbers and parts alone. The Radeon HD 6950 DirectCU II increases the stock core clock to 810MHz while the memory clock remains the same. But where this Radeon HD 6950 is in the cooling department which is based on direct heat pipe technology to help keep core clocks are bay.

Sapphire ATI Radeon HD 6970 2GB Dual Fan Overclocked:

If you were to take a look over at Sapphire’s website you will see several Radeon HD 6970 listed, 7 to be exact. Which, besides a possible bundled game, you may want to know what exactly the real differences between the models are. To put it briefly, all have a standard 880MHz core and 2GB of GDDR5 memory; some have a game bundle, some don't, but primarily it is a difference in the equipped cooler. That last one is where today's review sample comes in. It has dual fans to help with sound reduction, as well as better cooling in conjunction with the 8mm & 6mm heat pipes. There is also the dual BIOS switch, something normally available on many Radeon HD 6950 and HD 6990 models. We will get more into this during the review process, but felt we should break down what makes this model stand out.

The new SAPPHIRE HD 6970 has the same internal architecture as the standard model, with 1536 stream processors and 96 texture processing units, and clock speeds are 880MHz for the core and 1375 MHz (5.5Gb/sec effective) for the 2GB of GDDR5 memory. This new design has two 90mm fans with thin impellers that can move the same amount of air at 10% lower rotation speeds than conventional fans, keeping noise low, and their special dust repelling bearings contribute to high reliability. 

With the Dual BIOs set to the standard position, the Dual fans keep this model quiet and up to 25% cooler than the standard model even under load conditions. With the BIOS switched to the performance setting, the core voltage of the GPU is raised to 1.2V, the fan speed is set to a high performance profile and the power tune adjustment for overclocking is raised to 50% allowing the user to maximize performance of the card by increasing clock speeds either with AMD Overdrive or with SAPPHIRE TriXX up to a ceiling of 1500MHz core, 2000MHz memory.

*by andreascy*

PCI Express 4.0 16Gb/s per Lane

Posted by Andreas Christodoulou

Description :

Even though PCI Express 3.0 is still several months away, PCI Express 4.0 is already in the works and some basic specifications of the interconnection technologies are already known. The maximum bandwidth of the fourth generation of PCIe interconnect will be 16GT/s per lane. There will also be a number of new features implemented.

"The initial report we got yesterday is a PCI Express 4.0 is feasible - we have to work out the details, but it is feasible," said Al Yanes, president of the PCI SIG, reports EETimes. 

The group, which leads the development, includes AMD, Hewlett-Packard, IBM and Intel. It is reported that the companies are already conducting simulations using chip, channel, packet and socket data. Currently they reportedly expect to achieve speed of at least whopping 16GT/s per lane (which means 256Gb/s [32GB/s] bandwidth for PCI Express x16 slots). The target speed spec is projected to be delivered by the end of 2011. 

PCI Express 4.0 will continue to use copper wires, which is logical, given the fact that changing technology process for making graphics cards, mainboards and other devices is hardly economically feasible. Still, it will likely require new kind of manufacturing process and new materials while still maintaining backwards compatibility. That is a big shift for the PCIe community which has not previously required major changes of board makers, according to EETimes. 

PCIe 4.0 will probably be limited to distances of about 8 to 12 inches compared to 20 inches for PCI Express 3.0. It is noteworthy, though, that it took PCIe 3.0 four years to get developed with 8Gb/s speed. 

"We think we can eke out one more turn of the crank out of copper, so we are not looking at optics yet," said Ramin Neshanti, chairman of the PCI SIG's serial communications working chair. 

*by andreascy*

Pre Order : AMD A8-3870K and A6-3670K Unlocked APUs

Posted by Andreas Christodoulou

Description :

At the end of September we found out that until 2011 ended, AMD planned to launch two new chips in its A-Series APU product family which were supposed to come with unlocked multiplier, dubbed the A6-3670K and A8-3870K, and these two processors have now become available for pre-order in the US.

Both of these processors greatly resemble their predecessors, the A8-3870K coming as a 100MHz higher clocked version of the current A8-3850, which means that it now runs at 3GHz.

The second unlocked APU to be released by AMD is called the A6-3670K and this also is an almost exact copy of the A6-3650 it is meant to replace apart from the 2.7GHz operating speed, again 100MHz higher than that of its predecessor. 

Outside of the higher operating clock and unlocked multiplier, both of these chips will feature similar specifications as they sport quad processing cores with 4MB of Level 2 cache memory, an integrated dual-channel DDR3-1866MHz controller, and built-in Radeon HDgraphics. 

The power consumption of the two AMD accelerated processing units was also left untouched which means that is rated at 100W. 

Pre-order prices of the AMD A-Series 3670K and 3870K APUs listed by Bottom Line Telecommunications and uncovered by CPU-World are set at $121.50 (90.6 EUR) and $143.77 (107.25 EUR). 

On a quick look, these seem to be identical with what the current A6-3650 and A8-3850 chips are retailing for in the same store, so there is a strong possibility that AMD will introduce the new APUs at the same price level as their current counterparts. 

The unlocked multiplier design that AMD plans to introduce with the 3670K and 3870K will greatly improve their overclocking potential since the maximum FSB achieved by Llano APUs is severely limited at this point, mostly due the integrated graphics core. 

Read also other related AMD topics and comment below what do you think about our post. Spread the word about it!

*by andreascy*

AMD Opteron 6200, 4200 and 3000 Processors

Posted by Andreas Christodoulou

Description :

AMD presents the new AMD Opteron™ 6200 Series - the world’s first and only 16 - core x86 server processor with the highest core density for incredible scalability to handle demanding multi - threaded workloads such as cloud computing, virtualization, high - performance computing (HPC), databases and business applications.

The innovative modular architecture helps pack in more cores, making it the natural choice for heavy-threaded cloud computing environments and enterprise applications that demand outstanding performance and scalability.

The Opteron 6200 and 4200 Series processors (formerly code-named “Interlagos” and “Valencia”) are designed to give enterprises better performance for business with up to 84 percent higher performance, increased scalability for virtualization with up to 73 percent more memory bandwidth, enabling servers to host more virtual machines and also handle increasing workloads and more efficient economics for the Cloud with half the power per core, requiring 2/3 less floor space and up to 2/3 lower platform price.

The Opteron 3000 Series platform is targeted to the ultra-dense, ultra-low power 1P Web Hosting/Web Serving and Microserver markets. The first processor will be the 4-8 core CPU code-named “Zurich”, expected to ship in the first half of 2012. “Zurich” is based on the “Bulldozer” architecture and leverages the new Socket AM3+. This series offering is designed for hosting customers who require dedicated servers for their customers.

You can find more information and technical characteristics, with interesting performance measurements from AMD here and here. 

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*by andreascy*